Substrates that are bonding targets are bonded in ambient atmosphere via bonding films, including oxides, formed on bonding faces of the substrates. The bonding films, which are metal or semiconductor thin films formed by vacuum film deposition and at least the surfaces of which are oxidized, are formed into the respective smooth faces of two substrates having the smooth faces that serve as the bonding faces. The bonding films are exposed to a space that contains moisture, and the two substrates are overlapped in the ambient atmosphere such that the surfaces of the bonding films are made to be hydrophilic and the surfaces of the bonding films contact one another. Through this, a chemical bond is generated at the bonded interface, and thereby the two substrates are bonded together in the ambient atmosphere. The bonding strength γ can be improved by heating the bonded substrates at a temperature.

Conventional electrochromic devices frequently suffer from poor reliability and poor performance. Improvements are made using entirely solid and inorganic materials. Electrochromic devices are fabricated by forming an ion conducting electronically-insulating interfacial region that serves as an IC layer. In some methods, the interfacial region is formed after formation of an electrochromic and a counter electrode layer. The interfacial region contains an ion conducting electronically-insulating material along with components of the electrochromic and/or the counter electrode layer. Materials and microstructure of the electrochromic devices provide improvements in performance and reliability over conventional devices. In various embodiments, a counter electrode is fabricated to include a base anodically coloring material and one or more additives.

A laminate that improves barrier properties of an atomic layer deposition film in spite of use of a substrate made of a polymer material, and provides a gas barrier film and a method of producing the same. The laminate includes: a substrate made a polymer material; an undercoat layer disposed on at least part of a surface of the substrate and made up of an inorganic material containing Ta; and an atomic layer deposition film disposed so as to cover a surface of the undercoat layer.

An article comprises a body and a conformal protective layer on at least one surface of the body. The conformal protective layer is a plasma resistant rare earth oxide film having a thickness of less than 1000 μm, wherein the plasma resistant rare earth oxide film is selected from a group consisting of an Er—Y composition, an Er—Al—Y composition, an Er—Y—Zr composition, and an Er—Al composition.

A coated article may comprise a substrate and an optical coating. The substrate may have a major surface comprising a first portion and a second portion. A first direction that is normal to the first portion of the major surface may not be equal to a second direction that is normal to the second portion of the major surface. The optical coating may be disposed on at least the first portion and the second portion of the major surface. The coated article may exhibit at the first portion of the substrate and at the second portion of the substrate hardness of about 8 GPa or greater at an indentation depth of about 50 nm or greater as measured on the anti-reflective surface by a Berkovich Indenter Hardness Test.

A method for forming a coating system on a component includes depositing a reactive layer with predetermined CMAS reaction kinetics on at least a portion of a thermal barrier coating. The method also includes activating the reactive layer with a scanning laser. A component, such as a gas turbine engine component, includes a substrate, a thermal barrier coating and a reactive layer. The thermal barrier coating is deposited on at least a portion of the substrate. The reactive layer is deposited on at least a portion of the thermal barrier coating. The reactive layer has predetermined CMAS reaction kinetics activated by laser scanning.

An article comprises a body and a conformal protective layer on at least one surface of the body. The conformal protective layer is a plasma resistant rare earth oxide film having a thickness of less than 1000 μm, wherein the plasma resistant rare earth oxide film consists essentially of 40 mol % to less than 100 mol % of Y.sub.2O.sub.3, over 0 mol % to 60 mol % of ZrO.sub.2, and 0 mol % to 9 mol % of Al.sub.2O.sub.3.

Disclosed is a thin film stress control-based coating method for large-area coating. The method uses a two-step coating process in which a first coating layer that is a relatively low-hardness layer is primarily formed on a base member and a second coating layer that is a relatively high-hardness layer is secondarily formed on the first coating layer. The method can form a high-density coating structure that is hardly peeled off over a relatively large area compared to conventional coating methods by suppressing internal stress of the coating layers of the coating structure. Further disclosed is a coating structure manufactured by the same method.

Methods for preparing a void-free protective coating are disclosed herein. The void-free protective coating is used on a dielectric window having a central hole, which is used in a plasma treatment tool. A first protective coating layer is applied to the window, leaving an uncoated annular retreat area around the central hole. The first protective coating layer is polished to produce a flat surface and fill in any voids on the window. A second protective coating layer is then applied upon the flat surface of the first protective coating layer to obtain the void-free coating. This increases process uptime and service lifetime of the dielectric window and the plasma treatment tool.

Electrochromic devices and methods may employ the addition of a defect-mitigating insulating layer which prevents electronically conducting layers and/or electrochromically active layers from contacting layers of the opposite polarity and creating a short circuit in regions where defects form. In some embodiments, an encapsulating layer is provided to encapsulate particles and prevent them from ejecting from the device stack and risking a short circuit when subsequent layers are deposited. The insulating layer may have an electronic resistivity of between about 1 and 10.sup.8 Ohm-cm. In some embodiments, the insulating layer contains one or more of the following metal oxides: aluminum oxide, zinc oxide, tin oxide, silicon aluminum oxide, cerium oxide, tungsten oxide, nickel tungsten oxide, and oxidized indium tin oxide. Carbides, nitrides, oxynitrides, and oxycarbides may also be used.